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Father Knows Best
GL's Michael O'Leary has found wisdom and peace in the role of parent
by Caelie M. Haines
Soap Opera News
July 1, 1997

Parenthood has brought nothing but trouble to Rick Bauer's life on Guiding Light, but quite the opposite is true for Michael O'Leary, the actor who plays Rick. He finds 2 ½-year-old daughter Katie a constant delight.

"I love hanging out with her," says the actor. "We really enjoy each other's company. She's talking as much as she can talk.

"I can't imagine a parent not wanting to hang out with his kids," O'Leary adds. "So to have a job where you work two or three days a week and then can go hang out with your little girl is great. We go to the park and I see kids there with their nannies, but I'm the only father there. How many men get the chance to have that sort of presence in their kids' lives?

"The biggest thrill to me, to be a parent who can give not only quality time and quantity time."

O'Leary admits he's a little nervous about the arrival of his second child in August. "You wonder where everything is going to fit, how you're going to do it," he concedes. "But that's how you felt with number one on he way. Besides, it's not your timing-it's God's timing. We got Katie when I was out of work in L.A."

Fortunately, O'Leary got the call to return to GL and the East Coast, where both his and his wife's families live, shortly after his daughter made her debut. "Now Katie is with her grandparents all the time," he points out.

"The balance between work and family is really, really good for me right now," O'Leary adds. "It's a good place to be. It's calming. I think about where I was four or five years ago, and having a family has really brought a nice balance to my life."

O'Leary says in retrospect he's glad he's waited until he was in his 30s to become a dad. "I would have liked to have started when I was maybe two or three years younger, but we started when my maturity started," he says. "I believe things happen for a reason at the time they happen. And the bottom line is we have a child. And I took that for granted until I found out how many people couldn't get pregnant.

"I can't think of any regrets, I wish this or I wish that," he adds. "I'm in a good place, because I can look at my whole life and have some perspective about it because I'm stopping and smelling the roses now. Before, I was running on this treadmill trying to catch something," he explains. "Now I've found it, and now I can sit there and let life come to me instead of chasing after it. It's a good place to be." #